The US leadership that never failed to harp on its avowed principle of supporting the democratic forces all over the world has failed to notice the democratic change in Pakistan, which has opened a window of opportunity for the US to work with the people of Pakistan for a stable, prosperous and peaceful region as well as the world.

Rather in the last two weeks, it has done its utmost to create troubles for the democratic dispensation. Democratic Pakistan is in direct clash with the US over its perceived strategy how to handle ‘war on terror.’ Pakistan’s leadership, in consultation with all the democratic forces in the country wants to handle the problem differently, whereas, the US, on the other hand, needs Pakistan toe the line of its erstwhile president.

Pakistan’s defence Minister, Ahmed Mukhtar, had to come out in the open to declare that the US administration was unhappy with democratic Pakistan for removing Gen Musharraf.

The US paradigm shift in its ‘war on terror’ has plunged the whole region into yet another whirlpool of crisis and instability. The US decision not to respect Pakistan’s territorial integrity and sovereignty has come as a shocker to Pakistan policy makers who are caught nonplus and are quite ill at ease at the devastating turn of regional politics.

The situation looks graver when Karazai is found signing a secret agreement with India for sending a hundred fifty thousands soldiers to Afghanistan by 2009; when he directly blames Pakistan for terrorist attack on Indian Embassy in Kabul; when he demands of NATO forces to go into Pakistan in pursuit of so called interfering Talibans.

The shift is quite well thought out. The British prime minister in his regular monthly press conference on 11th September while answering a question if he approved the policy of troops crossing over from Afghanistan into Pakistan in hot pursuit said a new strategy was needed to halt the flow of Taliban and militant fighters between Pakistan and its neighbour.

He further said he would discuss a new approach to policing the Afghan-Pakistan border in talks with US President George W. Bush as well. Later the same day Mr Brown and Bush held a video-conference and assessed the work of US and NATO troops in Afghanistan. Pakistan and its leadership never figured in their talks.

Earlier on 10th September US Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Admiral Michael Mullen told a congressional hearing that he had commiss-ioned “a new, more comprehensive military strategy for the region that covers both sides of that border”. On his directives the US forces had already started pounding targets inside Pakistan in FATA without taking Pakistan government into confidence. Within ten days five targets were struck in which hundreds of innocents lives were lost.

For Pakistan, the sudden turn in events was unacceptable as well as hugely embarrass-ing. A front line sate in ‘war on terror’ was being attacked by the very country that had been acknowledging its role in the fight against terror. The buck has not stopped here. To mount the pressure further on Pakistan the US has demanded reforms in the ISI.

US Assistant Secretary of State for South Asian Affairs Richard Boucher in his speech at the Thomson Reuters Bureau in Washington on 15th Sept. said that the agency needed reforms and expressing his reservation over it said that there was no indication that this was happening. “It has to be done,” said he, “It’s sad 
to say, but the problem has become more and more acute.”

Mr Boucher warned that “as long as you have organisations, or pieces of organisa-tions, that work in different directions, then it’s harder for the government to accom-plish the goal” of defeating terrorists based in the tribal region and elsewhere in Pakistan.

In this background, President Zardari had to cancel his trip to China and visit UK to meet its leadership. The success of his visit will come about in the next few days. Mr. Zardari, however, at a joint conference with Mr Brown after 150 minutes meting on 15th Sep. was confident that there would not be any further cross-border raids inside Pakistan.

At the same time in Pakistan, visiting British Law and Justice Secretary Jack Straw was more candid than his Prime Minister. After a meeting with Prime Minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani here on Tuesday he stressed upon the need for respecting Pakistan’s territorial sovereignty and extending support to strengthen the new democr-atic government.

He said that foreign incursions into Pakistani territory would be counter-productive. He said Pakistan had faced a lot of problems and rendered a lot of sacrifices in the fight against terrorism. Earlier he had said that the Nato forces did not have the mandate to act outside Afghanistan.

Gen Keyani rightfully declared that no circumstances, no odds could force a country to exercise its right to defend its territorial integrity and sovereignty. The army ordered its forces to fire on US troops if they carried out another raid from across the Afghan border.

According to the army spokesman on Tuesday field commanders had been asked to prevent any further raid after US helicopters recently ferried troops into the South Waziristan tribal region. He said, “In case it happens again in this form, that there is a very significant detection, which is very definite, no ambiguity, across the border, on ground or in the air: open fire.”

Arbitrary change in the US policy towards Pakistan in relations to ‘war on terror’ has had debilitating effect on the war itself. It has proved counter productive. The US administration is feeling the heat as well. Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Michael Mullen arrived in Islamabad on Tuesday on an unannounced visit to discuss the security situation and the war against terror in relation with over stepped-up US incursions inside Pakistan’s territory.

US Defence Secretary Robert Gates is also simultaneously in the region. Mr. Mullen called on Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani on Wednesday where Chief of Army Staff, General Ashfaque Pervaiz Kayani, the Defence Minister, Ahmad Mukhtar, Foreign Minister, Shah Mahmood Quraishi, Interior Advisor, Rahman Malik, National Security Advisor, Mahmud Ali Durrani were already 
present.

A battle of nerve is going on. A dictator at a moment of crisis had buckled in earning huge loss of life and property for innocent Pakistanis. Can leadership of a democratic Pakistan withstand the pressure on a principled stand where autocratic one had failed? We call fight against terror our own fight, which justifiably is, therefore, we should fight according to our own judgement and planning, and not turn our region into yet another inferno.

Information

The US paradigm shift in its ‘war on terror’ has plunged the whole region into yet another whirlpool of crisis and instability. The US decision not to respect Pakistan’s territorial integrity and sovereignty has come as a shocker to Pakistan policy makers who are caught nonplus and are quite ill   at ease at the devasta-ting turn of regional politics. 

First appeared in Pakistan observer, Islamabad on Sept. 21, 2008